At Small Wars Journal Jack Burton finds a post that links to an Air Force mag that leads with a revelation that maybe the AF should buy propeller aircraft that made his Friday pint of Guinness go down the wrong pipe and start a cacophony of unprintable noises. Jack Burton was once comforted by a little Vietnamese prop plane as it made tiny u-turns above the battle space like a angry mother hen smacking everything in range and was then was greatly disappointed when a monster sized phantom jet shooed the tiny bug plane away to drop one measly bomb and then take a humongous 360 turn that practically took it to the New-York-City limits. I want that little bug plane back was the only thought Jack Burton had as he nose-dived into the mud away from the returning NVA fire raking Jack's hillside. For godsake, man, that was what....40 something years ago...Damn. A bug plane with the WWII propellers was a good idea then and a great idea now. Does nothing ever really change in the DOD?
Inside the Air Force published a piece in their latest newsletter that makes sense - at the very least as a matter for serious study - Light-Attack Plane Could Save USAF Billions in O&M, Preserve Fighters (subscription required) by Marcus Weisgerber.
April 4, 2008 -- The Air Force could save billions in operations and maintenance costs if it shifts away from using gas-guzzling fighter jets in Iraq and Afghanistan and invests instead in a light-attack, propeller-driven aircraft, one theater-based commander says.
